Sujatha Singh

Sujatha Singh is an Indian career diplomat who is currently India's Foreign Secretary. She assumed office on 1 August 2013 succeeding Ranjan Mathai. Prior to her appointment she was the Indian Ambassador to Germany (2012-2013).^[2]

Family and education

Born in July 1954, Sujatha Singh is the daughter of the former Intelligence Bureau chief and, later, Governor T. V. Rajeswar. She is an alumnus of the Lady Shri Ram College, New Delhi and the Delhi School of Economics from where she graduated in economics. She is married to Sanjay Singh, who is a retired Indian Foreign Service officer.^[1][3][4]

Career

Singh is an Indian Foreign Service officer of the 1976 batch. She has served in various positions at the Indian embassies at Bonn, Accra, Paris, Bangkok and was India's Consul General at Milan during 2000-04. She has also served as India's High Commissioner to Australia (2007-2012). In Delhi she has served on the Ministry's Economic Co-ordination Unit and dealt with Nepal, West Europe and the EU as director, undersecretary and joint secretary.^[5] Her tenure as High Commissioner to Australia was marked by turbulence in Indo-Australian ties following racial attacks on Indian students and later by the Australian Labour Party's decision to make an exception for India regarding the sale of uranium. She has a reputation for toughness, volunteering as a liaison officer on a rain-hit Kailash Manasarovar Yatra in 1983,^[6] taking a tough stance with the Australian authorities on dealing with the racial attacks against Indians there,^[3] and, as joint secretary handling Western Europe, she advocated India's stance of not accepting prescriptive aid from small European Union nations.^[7][8]

Foreign Secretary

Sujatha Singh was chosen as Foreign Secretary over S. Jaishankar who is currently India's Ambassador to United States as the senior-most officer in the service. She has never served in any of India's neighboring nations which is seen as a challenge. Singh will be the third lady officer to head the Indian diplomatic corps after Chokila Iyer and Nirupama Rao. She is a German speaker and will serve as Foreign Secretary for a two year term ending in August 2015.^{[1][4][9][10]} Singh has identified improving ties with India's neighbors as her immediate priority and is scheduled to make her inaugural visit as Foreign Secretary to Bhutan to smooth tensions that have crept into the Indo-Bhutanese ties on account of India's decision to withdraw gasoline subsidies.^[11]

References